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// Compliment... Mistake? 
// Story: What If 
// by Freed_Writer 
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This was a request that turned into an entry for a small story competition. I never really wanted to post it as it's not my normal but if it's liked then I'll put it up maybe even add more to it.

Apparently I made a mistake. I didn’t know there are some compliments you keep only for your marefriend or crush. Complimenting another mare’s mane is one of them. The day started out like normal. I woke up and immediately smelled breakfast. After walking out of my room I told Flutter Shy she looks beautiful as always. Her smile was brilliant and while she always had one on todays was bigger and more prominent something made her very happy.

“You seem really happy what happened?”

“Listen to the birds.” I stopped and listened to the tweeting.

“I don’t notice anything different.”

“There are more of them. The eggs hatched.” It took me a second to hear the extra chirps as they were quieter but finally I could tell them apart from the other birds.

“I hear them now. They’re so delicate.”  She went back to her cooking. I never thought to ask her what she made, not that I really cared. It was always delicious. We had to go up to Canterlot today. Apparently Twilight Sparkle wanted to see Flutter Shy for something and Flutter Shy wanted me to come along.

“Are you ready for today?”

“Well I don’t think I can get anymore ready.”

“We should leave in about 30 minutes so be ready by then.”

“Have I ever not been ready to leave?”

“Well there was the picnic, the dinner, the halloween party, the thanksgiving parade, the christmas dinner with Cadance, and… should I keep going?”

“No you’re good.” the smile must have faded from my face because she got concerned.

“I’m sorry I got a little carried away, forgive me.”

“No, no, It’s ok. You have a point.” We ate breakfast and headed up to the castle. It had been a while but it was clear changes had been made. The silver gates were more guarded and so were the marble walls. They had recently tended to the lawn; the entrance stones had been replaced. As we entered the castle the teak support beams shined each one glowed under the morning sunlight

“You made it!” Twilight yelled as she ran to give Flutter Shy a hug.

“Flutter Shy never told me you were coming as well so I never made arrangements for you. I'll try and have things put together but I can't promise anything.”

“It’s ok no worries.” a big black mass caught my eye.

“Who is that?” I pointed a hoof toward the stallion.

“Oh that’s Shadow Colt, Shadow for short.” I was fine seeing him from this far but Twilight called him over!

“Hello guys! What can I do Twilight?”

“I wanted you to finally meet Flutter Shy and her friend.”

“It’s nice to meet you guys.” My fear was blatant as he held out a hoof to shake.

“Is something wrong?” Flutter asked me.

“Huh? Oh no!” I forced myself to shake his hoof.

“Twilight, can I talk to you?” Shadow asked.

“Excuse me guys.” she said to us as she walked away.

“What was that about?” Flutter’s smile had started to turn sour.

“I just… he wasn’t right, it's like he’s not natural.”

“That’s rude!”

“It’s just a feeling that doesn't mean anything, maybe it’s because he is so much bigger than me.”

“Rainbow Dash!” Flutter yelled at a very correctly named pegasus. She came trotting over giving a hug to her friend. This is where I made a mistake.

“Wow, your mane is beautiful.” Immediately a bigger pony was behind me.

“Thank you! Meet Blue Light. He's a good friend of mine." He walked out from behind me, eyeing me the whole time.

“It’s nice to meet you Blue.” I said. I had already been a butthole and I didn't want to seem even more like one.

“Hello.” he said back, still staring at a hole in my head.

“Blue, is something wrong?” Dash asked him.

“No.” He said, turning his head to look at her and a smile appeared on his face at her sight.

“Who is that?” I asked. It was a pony similar in color to shadow but lighter and more blue in color.

“Oh that’s Obsidian Shard Shadow’s son.” sure enough she called him over and you could probably guess who followed him.

“Everytime i ask about somepony you guys call them over.” I put a chuckle after it as I didn’t want to sound rude. It wasn't my intention to.

“Why are you being so rude today?”

“I wasn’t trying to, I promise. It’s just ironic that two ponies have done it so far. I’m sorry if you thought i was being rude Dash it was my intention to be rude.”

“It’s ok, I understand.” Rainbow Dash got called over to somepony else as Shadow and his son got to us.

“Sorry I didn’t introduce you guys earlier. This is my son Obsidian Shard, or Shard for short.”

“I’ve seen you before.” Shard said, looking at me.

“Where?” I asked.

“Dad, do you remember the scouting trip about two months back?”

“Oh yeah! I thought I recognized you but I didn’t know where from. I hope we didn’t cause any trouble for you. We weren't sure who or what you were so we ended up reporting you as a sighting.”

“I never got anything but at least I know the area is safe.”

“So how did you and Flutter Shy meet?” Shadow asked

“Well… I kind of found him out in the forest.” Flutter said.

“You found him?”

“Well you see… i’m not from h-”

“Canterlot he’s not from Canterlot.” Flutter interjected

“Oh ok. Well it’s nice to know a little more about you guys.” They walked away.

“Be careful what you say, not everyone knows about you.”

“I know.” The place had become even fuller, more ponies had arrived and they began to take seats at any of the many circular tables in the dining hall. We took a seat at a table with Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Blue who was still giving me looks, and Shadow and his son. There was still one other seat next to me that was empty. I had gotten deep into conversation with twilight so much so that I didn't see the griffon that sat next to me. When Twilight broke the conversation to refill her drink I noticed the creature and about flipped out of my chair.

“Hah! I told you that's 5!” The griffon sighed, passing 5 gold bits to Shadow. He lended a hand? Claw? To help me up I accepted and I got back upright.

“He’s the nicest griffon you’ll ever come across and he’ll make a bet anytime.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“Alrighty then. That pony there is going to cause the mare in the chair over there to either choke on her drink or fall out of her chair for 5 bits.”

“Bet.” We waited for a little and sure enough the pony hit the Mares chair and it buckled right out from under her.

“And that… is 5 bits.”

“Please don’t make a habit of this.” Flutter pleaded.

“I won’t.” I did. I was also disappointed to find out that the only drinks available were water and water… with lemon. As the event went on Shadow disappeared more often Twilight as well. Finally Shadow walked up to me.

“Can I talk to you?” I turned to flutter but she was too deep in conversation to know what was happening. I assumed I had no option but to go with him so I followed him.

“You were wary of me earlier.”

“Yeah. You’re just scary to be honest.”

“Yeah I get that a lot. I don’t want you to feel threatened by me as a captain of the royal guard. I'm here to protect you, not scare you.”

“Yeah I understand that.”

“That’s not why I wanted to talk to you though. Did something happen between you and Blue Light?”

“The only thing that comes to mind is when I complimented Rainbow Dash on her mane.”

“Oh! Yep! That’s where you screwed up. Blue is very protective of Rainbow Dash; he also gets bothered really easily by those types of comments. Just keep it low, only talk to her if she talks to you. Trust me if you make him mad you’ll wish you hadn’t.”

“What happened between you and him?”

“I simply was watching her fly and he tried to fight me.”

“Obsessive much?”

“Beyond obsessive. I can’t blame him too much though he tried hard to get her and then he got hurt causing a whole bunch of issues between the two of them to the point Dash wouldn’t even talk to him. He was able to make up to her and now he just doesn’t want to fail her.”

“I understand. How did he get hurt?”

“We’re royal guards…”

“Nevermind.”

“You seem pretty hardy even though you were afraid of feathers…”

“He was much more than feathers. I’m also not Royal Guard material.”

“Well here anyways.” he handed me a card.

“A business card?”

“Every royal guard gets one that way if a civilian needs a way to contact a guard after an incident they have one.”

“Oh ok that makes sense. How do you guys train for a job like this? Do you just fight each other?” I laughed.

“Well, yes but not in the way you’re thinking. It's practice, usually just a scuffle where we go over techniques and takedowns."

"Oh ok, sounds like fun."

"We start early but it's ok if you're not here directly at the start just be here before 8am."

"Well like I said this isn't something I know how to do nor something I really want to do."

"It's ok I understand, feel free to come though you'll get a good laugh." He walked away. I couldn't help but think, did he see something in me that I didn't? The night went on and it only got worse. I didn't find out until I was leaving that someone had spiked the apple cider they brought out. So for about half the time I was drunk. Me and the trash can became good  friends that night. Flutter tried to help but there's not much that could be done. I got maybe one hour of sleep that night and didn't go to see Shadow that morning either. I felt bad he really wanted me there for some reason and I had disappointed him. I made sure the next day that I was there bright and early. As I walked through the castle at 7am it gave me a chance to look at the place uninterrupted. The castle shined like it had been cleaned the night before. The white marble floor was so shiny I could see myself and the stained glass windows shone many different colors upon the floor.

"You made it!" My head shot up from the floor at which I gazed.

"Yeah sorry about yesterday I was sick after dinner."

"Yeah, so is my son. He really liked the cider."

"He's still sick?"

"Oh yeah he doesn't recover too quickly on many things sadly."

"I'm sorry to hear, do you know who did it?"

"No but I'm sure Celestia or Luna do."

“Hopefully something will come of it.” We walked down the hall to where his group got ready.

“Is this the new guy?”

“No he’s just here to watch.”

“Oh…”

“The guy you're thinking of will be here later.”

“Shadow seems to think I would be a good fit for this job.”

“Well I actually think you would be a great doctor.”

“You're out of your tree.” I said. Seriously a doctor I never was nor was I ever anything near a doctor.

“Not like a surgeon but an emotional one. We get our fair share of guys who get emotionally messed up. I think you can help with that. You laugh easily. You're relatively soft spoken and you can walk it back whenever you make a mistake.”

“It’s just not my thing, I can't do that reliably.”

“Look, we have one guy that could use some help. Will you at least try to help him?” I sighed but offered my help.

“We’ll leave you with him, just walk out when you’re done we’ll be right outside.” I turned to the only pony left in the room while contemplating what I just got myself into. He looked pretty beat up and still had a few bruises. A bandage wrapped all the way around his neck.

“So apparently Shadow thinks I can help you.”

“That’s a great way to start.” He was writing on a pad of paper so that told me two things: one  he can’t talk and two he’s pissed.

“Well I want to help you. Nopony deserves to feel bad.”

“How can you help me if you can’t even believe in yourself?”

“How do you think you’ll get better if you can’t believe in yourself?”

“I don’t think I'll get better.”

“Exactly you can’t doubt yourself or nothing will ever change.”

“It's impossible to unsee.”

“I get it.”

“No you don’t get it, you've never been stabbed in the neck.”

“You’re right I don't know what it’s like to get stabbed in the neck but I do understand how such an experience can be impossible to unsee.”

“It happened so quickly it simply hurt then I woke up with Doc.”

“Better quickly than to be lying on the ground in pain though right?”

“I saw it coming, I saw the whole thing.” 

“This just shows you in what ways you can get better. You got hurt, you made it out and now you can build back better and stronger so that this doesn’t happen again. Yeah you may be weaker now but it won’t take long for you to build back and be better.”

“That's not the issue, I know that. I know I can be better than when I got hurt. It’s the fact that I can't talk, I can't be normal anymore.”

“Normal is whatever you want it to be. Who is to define your normal?”

“I am defining my normal and my normal means I talk.”

“Sometimes we have to modify what we call normal. I have had too many times.”

“If you change it you admit defeat.”

“So?”

“Admitting defeat is the worst thing you can do, when you do that everyone thinks differently of you.”

“You’re a guard no one will think differently of you. Getting hurt is something that sometimes happens.”

“I will think differently of myself.”

“Well that’s just stupid.”

“Yeah I know.”

“When was the last time you participated in the training?”

“About a week ago.”

“Participate in today's training and you won’t regret it.”

“Fine.” I walked out to Shadow and the other guys.

“How is he?”

“He’ll be joining you guys in training today.”

“How the hell did you do it? We’ve been trying for weeks.”

“I have no clue.”

“Doesn’t matter, it's great! You’re staying with us for training right?”

“Why would I?”

“Because it’s funny.” One of the guards said.

“I just figured you’d want to, that's all.”

“I don’t know how Flutter would feel about that.”


“I don’t think she would care. I don't know of anything that can make her mad.” I agreed to watch and maybe participate a little. This is where I messed up. When Blue heard I might participate a large smile crossed his face. To put it simply, I now know to only compliment Flutter. Blue had a great time destroying me in every training activity. I got to meet Doctor Whooves though and I can say he was pretty cool. He knew a lot of things I didn’t know and I came home to Flutter with many new tips, tricks, and ideas. One of them being a quicker way to remove a burn because for some reason we both managed to burn ourselves no matter what we did to prevent it.

“How was the trip?” Flutter asked as I walked in. I turned so she could see my left hind leg which was wrapped up and forced to stay extended.

“Looks like you had fun.”

“Do you remember the compliment I made to Rainbow Dash?”

“Yeah”

“Apparently Blue got insecure and used the training session as an excuse to beat me up.”

“I‘m sorry. What did Shadow want from you? He seemed eager at the dinner.”

“He thought I had what it takes to be a psychological doctor.”

“Really?”

“Well he stuck me in a room with a guy and I was able to get him to participate in the training.”

“You should keep going with that, that’s amazing!”

“Well he did say he was going to talk to the royal sisters so maybe I can do something with this.” She warned me to be careful. The sisters don’t know what she does and neither of us know what they will do if they find out. I want to go farther with this but I don't want to put Flutter at risk of anything bad. I guess I have some thinking to do.